


not one of them (knows the end)

by lady_krysis (saekhwa)



Category: The Losers (2010)
Genre: Angst, Canon Character of Color, Character Death, Character(s) of Color, Community: ante_up_losers, Female Character of Color, Female Friendship, Female Protagonist, Gen, Gift Exchange, Male Character of Color, Memory Alteration, Mind Control, Mind Manipulation, POV Character of Color, POV Female Character, Wordcount: 1.000-3.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-30
Updated: 2014-01-30
Packaged: 2018-01-10 14:33:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,273
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1160818
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saekhwa/pseuds/lady_krysis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Max takes the team's safe haven.</p>
            </blockquote>





	not one of them (knows the end)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lunesque (Moriavis)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moriavis/gifts).



She heard her name. 

"Jolene," stretched several seconds too late. 

Like the shot ringing in her ears. Like the gun slipping from her fingers.

~*~

Becky reached across the sofa, and red wine sloshed from her glass. "Damn it." She rubbed the fabric with her fingers and then used the heel of her palm. 

"It's okay," Jolene said, and waved a hand. "Don't worry about it."

"Sorry," Becky said one more time, and then grabbed the black picture frame off the side table. 

She stared at it, stroking the glass surface with her knuckle. Eyes glazed, cheeks flushed, she flipped the picture around to show Jolene. "Remember this?"

Jolene stared at Lin's face. Her own, in the picture, was scrunched in a smile. Lin was kissing her cheek, her wind-swept hair framing the close up shot and blocking out the background. Jolene remembered. 

Lin had returned home from another long tour. He hadn't taken a shower. Instead, he'd taken Jolene for a long walk. He'd smelled musty, and his palm had been rough against hers, grime caked beneath his fingernails. He'd come home, though, and that was all they needed. 

So Jolene nodded. Slowly, at first, and then with a steady bob that she stopped by finishing her wine. She queued "Unforgettable" on her laptop. 

"Amen," Becky said, and topped off their wine glasses.

~*~

Becky squeezed Jolene's hand. "I'm here. Every step of the way. You aren't alone, you got that?"

Jolene answered with a two-finger salute and, "Yes, ma'am." Then she leaned against Becky's shoulder. "We were trying to save money but—" Her breath hitched. 

"We'll get through this," Becky said again, their mantra since they'd picked up their flags and tags. "So no taking seedy money from strangers in suits."

Jolene laughed. She let herself give in to the shudder and shake and warmth of it, hugging Becky tighter and tighter. 

The seedy stranger in a suit had been a long-time joke between them. After all, in the absence of what the boys could discuss, Jolene and Becky knew what they were. 

Then that seedy stranger appeared one afternoon while Jolene pushed the buggy of groceries to her car. He had dark eyes and a square jaw and wore a three-piece white suit. The most striking part about him, though, was his hand. Not the one that he extended toward her with the smoothness of his, "Hello, Mrs. Porteous." The left one at his side, encased in a black glove. 

~*~

"You okay, Jo?" Becky poked her head into the kitchen. "Shit!" She jumped forward and grabbed Jolene's wrist. "What the hell happened?"

Jolene shook her head. "I don't know. I—" She shook her head again. "The knife slipped."

"Over here, over here." Becky dragged Jolene to the kitchen sink. 

The cold water stung, but Jolene held her breath against it only to be stopped when the baby kicked. 

"The good news," Becky said after a moment, gently pushing away the blood with her thumb, "is that I don't see bone." She held Jolene's finger up for a closer look and squinted. "It looks pretty deep, though." Becky lowered Jolene's hand and looked her straight in the eyes. "We might need the super glue plus band-aid treatment."

It sounded like an idea from one of the boys. Jolene wanted to laugh, but— "It's okay. I'm okay. I just—"

"Sliced the crap out of your finger. Come on. I got Beth Pokemon band-aids. Maybe she'll let us borrow one."

Jolene followed Becky up the stairs. Halfway up, she thought she heard the phone ring.

~*~

Jolene opened her eyes. Instead of white hospital walls, she saw someone in a black rain coat standing at the end of her bed. Rivulets of water dripped off the large hood while she searched for the call button in the folds of the blanket. When she found it, she held it tightly, tucked it against her hip, thumb poised. 

"Jo." He raised his head, and Jolene hit the button on, "Baby."

~*~

"Jerk." Becky punched Jensen's arm, because he stood closest to her and everyone knew she had rights on calling out her baby brother for what she dubbed 'crap like this.'

" _Ow_ ," Jensen said, heartfelt, and rubbed his arm. "Nice seeing you, too. Welcome home. Congrats you're alive."

"I knew," Jolene whispered against Lin's throat, because the moment he'd been close enough to grab, she couldn't let him go. "I just knew. They didn't have—"

"This?" Jolene's hands tightened on his raincoat when he pulled away, and he patted her hand as he reached into his coat. The moment Jolene saw the chain, she knew his wedding ring dangled at the end of it. "You know I'd never give this up." He kissed her and slipped the ring against her palm. The bumps of the chain made Jolene's palm tingle, but she held on tight until Lin pulled it loose. She slid the ring back onto his finger, where it belonged, held his hand, and didn't let go.

~*~

Lin and the baby were her world, but she had a larger world, too. She finally took a look at their boys — hers and Becky's — and had to scan the room twice, her throat sealing shut on the second pass. 

"Where's Roque?"

The boys looked at each other, and then they all turned to Clay. 

Becky stood almost instantly and aimed a finger at Clay. "Don't you dare."

Clay looked at her, gestured with a hand to emphasize, "He's gone."

"It was Roque," Lin said, rubbing the top of Jolene's hand. 

Jensen narrowed his eyes, mouth pulled tight as he said, "Bastard doublecrossed us," low and dangerous.

Jolene shook her head, motion mirrored by Becky, who looked from Clay to Cougar to Jensen to Lin, waiting for one of them to add more to the story. 

Clay only repeated the end of it. "He's gone."

Like _oh, god_. Like Jolene crumpling to her knees.

~*~

Aisha caught her. Jolene didn't expect that and didn't expect Aisha's arms to be strong enough to support her weight and gentle her fall. Aisha stared ahead, but Jolene couldn't. She couldn't look. She _couldn't_. 

She clutched Aisha's arms and stared at the hard lines of Aisha's face, heard, "Fuck," heard a different voice say, "Get that goddamn gun," heard, "How," and then the sound of herself retching. 

Aisha shoved Jolene away but held her shoulder and her hair while Jolene choked up bile with tears in her eyes. 

"Is this—" But Jolene shuddered and coughed. _Is this what Max did? Is this …?_ She croaked, "Roque," but Aisha said, "Max." Then. "She's compromised."

"Are, are—" The words were hiccups, caught in Jolene's throat, twisting her stomach. 

"She's not fucking compromised," Lin said.

He closed his hands around her shoulders, but when he tried to pull her up, she stiff-armed him and kept her ground. 

"No, Lin." She leaned closer to Aisha and swallowed, meeting Aisha's eyes first. Aisha didn't blink or nod or waver. It allowed Jolene to inhale a quick breath, feel the sting of the gravel scraping her knuckles when she curled her hands into fists. 

"Baby," Lin said, but she whipped herself around.

Blood, gun, her breath exploding out of her, Lin squeezing her so she couldn't take another one in, and Clay. Like Roque. 

"What are we going to do?" Jensen asked somewhere in between the gaps in Jolene's memories. 

Aisha shook her head. "Nothing. It was going to happen." Aisha took the gun and put it in Jolene's palm, pushing Jolene's fingers closed around it. "Sooner or later."

~*~

_"The beauty of this, Wade, is that anyone can be trained in the program."_


End file.
